Patrick’s Rants

The air is crisp. Costumes are in the stores and I just had my first pound of candy corns. Of all the food groups I love candy corns the best. And if they weren’t just the best group, my daughter pointed out that with the different colors they are their own food pyramid. Now that’s a food!

That bumber stickers like “Eve was framed”, “The only Bush I trust is my Own” and “Well Behaved Women Rarely Make History”, appear to emblazon bumbers of (some kinds of) women?

At this point the article below is a little old. A friend of mine relayed me a story regarding evacuees in Phoenix. The way he tells it, a group gathered items of clothing, etc. to give to the evacuees staying here in Arizona and drove to where they were being housed. The Red Cross turned them away at the door - telling them to only bring cash. This group then packed all the household goods onto trucks and drove to Texas to deliver them.
Later, when individuals were talking to evacuees here in Phoenix, an exchange took place somewhat like the following: Vistor: “What kinds of things do you need?”
Evacuee: “We need clothing and household goods. But, we keep hearing that no-one here is donating those things to the Red Cross.”
My friend will not donate anything to the Red Cross.

Red Cross criticized, urged to share cash
By DAVID CRARY
AP National Writer
09/29/2005

NEW YORK — As its hurricane relief donations near the $1 billion mark, more than double all other charities combined, the American Red Cross is encountering sharp criticism of its efforts and mounting pressure to share funds with smaller groups.

And, apparently to even share the donations of goods to evacuees. (more…)

I have Squid and squidGuard installed on my home network. Squid is supposed to speed up the internet connection by caching pages that have been visited before and only checking the internet when new content is available. SquidGuard uses filtering to block sites for users on the network. As luck would have it, last night when attempting to check out a web page I started hearing a clunking sound from the firewall computer. I turned on the monitor and the worst diagnosis available was on the screen. Unable to access the hard drive. (more…)

MAFIAA - Music, Art and Film Industries Association of America

Now and then I have to steal a joke from someone who stole if from someone else
This gem comes from Jake at utterlyboring.com
Donald Rumsfeld is giving the president his daily briefing. He concludes by saying: “Yesterday, three Brazilian soldiers were killed.”

“OH NO!” the president exclaims. “That’s terrible!”

His staff sits stunned at this display of emotion, nervously watching as the president sits, head in hands. Finally, the president looks up and asks, “Just how many is a brazillion?”
Thanks Barn for the joke.
Original post

Tom Delay, former House majority leader, is confident that he will be back in the House saddle again soon¹. Delay, who has been admonished by the Ethics committee, kept the leadership position due the Republicans changing the rules for their own gain. Again².

Earlier this year, House Republicans rewrote a party rule so that DeLay can keep his leadership job even if he is indicted by a Texas grand jury. The grand jury has indicted three of his political associates in an investigation of campaign finances related to a House redistricting plan that DeLay helped push through in Texas.

And in case anyone should forget - the Republicans wrote this rule in their favor when the Democrats were in control and suffering ethics charges. Now that the GOP is in power ethics seem to be something they want us to forget about.
It’s time the “Hammer” - as he likes to be called - gets nailed.

1 - Delay confident in regaining his job
2 - House changes ethics rules to favor Republicans

If you make it to Oregano’s in Flagstaff, the little known beer to ask for is Sunshine Wheat. It is a clean, light beer that is served uniquely with a slice of orange (when they don’t run out ;))

Cleaning out my email, I discovered this little gem. Senseless and goofy, but I kinda needed it today.

AUTO REPAIR
A blonde pushes her BMW into a gas station. She tells
the mechanic it died. After he works on it for a few
minutes, it is idling smoothly. She says, “What’s
the story?” He replies, “Just crap in the carburetor.”
She asks, “How often do I have to do that?”
—————————————-

SPEEDING TICKET
A police officer stops a blonde for speeding and asks
her very nicely if he could see her license. She
replied in a huff, “I wish you guys would get your act
together. Just yesterday you take away my license and
then today you expect me to show it to you!”
————————–
(more…)